The subject matter disclosed herein relates to task planning and navigation of a robot in an occupied environment.
Various entities may employ robots or other autonomously controlled devices in an indoor environment or other environment in which humans also are present. For example, such devices may be employed to move or deliver items within the environment, to clean or inspect portions of the environment, or to operate instrumentation or equipment within the environment.
In such contexts, conventional applications may employ a real-time sensing to allow the robot or similar device to determine the presence and/or location of humans in the environment in real-time and to react to avoid contacting the sensed humans. Such real-time sensing and avoidance, however, may be computationally intensive and may impact the computational resources of the device (e.g., robot). In addition, sense and react approaches, while suitable for dealing with immediate surroundings, may be poorly suited for task and/or motion planning in the context of overall planning, as opposed to reaction.